Directions: Meet at the Sandy Beach parking lot off the Mystic
Valley Parkway by the Upper Mystic Lakes in Winchester. The walk will
follow the route of the Middlesex Canal through parts of Medford and
Winchester. Sites along the way include the aqueduct and mooring basin,
those segments of the canal bed and berm visible off the parkway, and
the stone wall of the Brooks estate, in Medford.

This walk is jointly listed as a Local Walk of the Boston Chapter of
the Appalachian Mountain Club (AMC).

Historic Bicycle Tour of Middlesex Canal

On Sunday, October 15, 2006, the Somerville Historic Preservation
Commission, the Middlesex Canal Commission and the Middlesex Canal Association
will sponsor the 4th annual historic bicycle tour of the southern portion of the
Middlesex Canal. The Canal was the "big dig" of the end of the 18th
century. Completed in 1803 after 10 years of construction, the Canal connected
the Merrimac River in what is now Lowell with the Charles River at Sullivan
Square in Charlestown. In many ways it served as a model for later canals
including the Erie Canal. The Canal remained in operation for 50 years,
providing both passenger and freight service, but could not compete successfully
with the Boston and Lowell Railroad which began operation in the 1830’s.

The ride will meet at the Canal marker on the Sullivan Square MBTA station at
9:00am. From there we will ride about 28 miles to the Canal Museum on the
Millpond in North Billerica. We will make a lunch stop in Woburn. We recommend
that you bring a lunch, but it will be possible to buy a sandwich there. We
should get to North Billerica in time for anyone who wants to catch the 3:07pm
train back to Boston. The ride will then follow the northern section of the
Canal another 10 miles from North Billerica to Lowell and catch the 5:00pm train
back from there.

The route is pretty flat and level and we will average 5 miles per hour, so
the ride will be an easy one for almost any cyclist. Along the way we will stop
at a number of remnants and restored sections of the Canal, as well as the
mansion of Loammi Baldwin, the chief engineer of the Canal (who discovered the
Baldwin apple while building the Canal), the two remaining aqueducts (which
carried the Canal over rivers and brooks), and the northern end of the floating
towpath that was once used for towing boats across the Concord River in N.
Billerica.

The ride will be led by Dick Bauer of the Somerville Historic Preservation
Commission and Robert Winters of the Middlesex Canal Association and will go
ahead rain or shine. For more information, contact Dick at 617-628-6320 (e-mail
removed) or Robert at robert@middlesexcanal.org.
Additional information and updates will be posted at http://www.middlesexcanal.org.

President’s Message

Dear Members,

We can almost see the light in the end of the tunnel on our application for
the National Registry of Historic Places. The Mass. Historic Commission has
reviewed the final submission and we will be having public meetings in November.
Tom Raphael and Susan Keats have labored long and hard on this project.

October is dues month. We hope that everyone will be renewing shortly.

We have talked about a campaign to recruit new members but have not organized
anything yet. We propose to have a speakers’ bureau and that is a work in
progress.

Far too infrequently do we take the time to thank all our volunteers
for a good job - well done. The outstanding accomplishments by the Middlesex
Canal Association would not have been possible without your endless
contributions.

Shayne and John Reardon with the Billerica section of the Middlesex Canal
Commission continue to cover our superb Museum in North Billerica - what a gem!
Tom Dahill has come up with another wall mural depicting the Middlesex Village -
just before the descent into the Merrimack River - it’s huge and the children
love it! Jean Potter, Tom Dahill and Betty Bigwood continue the Education
Program where students come to the Museum after having had several lessons in
their classroom - it is well received - the students are our future. Roger
Hagopian, Robert Winters and Bill Gerber lead our Spring and Fall walks - Bill
took on the additional task of leading students along the Butter’s Row section
of the canal as part of the Education Program. Tom Raphael has almost finished
the National Registry application which will put the entire canal on a
definitive map. Tom Raphael, as chairman of the MCC, continues to work on all
the details of the Middlesex Canal Park at the Concord Mill Pond. Robert Winters
keeps our web site up to snuff - there is a wealth of information there. Robert
also produces Towpath Topics, our excellent newsletter.

Howard Winkler, as treasurer, keeps us honest and our books in order. Jean
Potter is our new secretary. Wilbar Hoxie continues to be our historian and
frequently serves as a docent at the Museum. Roger Hagopian continues to edit
programs in CD and DVD format for viewing at the museum, for purchase, and for
local TV. Alan Seaberg is going to chair a committee to arrange for interesting
programs to be on call as the need arises. Neil Devins provides us with up to
date memberships reports and frequently docents at the museum.

A few years ago David Dettinger did an excellent piece of research on the
extension of the Middlesex Canal through Boston. This served as a nidus for our
approach to the Central Artery Project to have some feature recognizing the
canal in Boston. A few months ago there was an agreement - we will now have a
Canal park - 30 by 30ft at the end of Canal Street as it enters New Chardon St -
now a bit of rubble, but plans are in the making. We are thrilled.

We have had the support of our Senators and Representatives in raising funds
- especially Rep. James Miceli. The Museum and the Canal Park plans would not
have been possible without his support.

I have now served as President of the MCA longer than any other. I am proud
of each of you and thank you for all your efforts.

Sincerely,
Nolan Jones, MCA
President
(603) 672-7051

Short Biographies of James Sullivan and Loammi Baldwin
from Dictionary of American Biography, c. 1999; used by permission of
Oxford University Press, New York;
contact made by Howard Winkler, Treasurer.

SULLIVAN, James (22 Apr. 1744 - 10 Dec. 1808), lawyer and politician,
was born in Berwick, District of Maine, then part of Massachusetts, the son of
John Sullivan, a schoolteacher, and Margery Brown. After being schooled at home
by his father, he studied law starting in 1765 with his older brother John
Sullivan, a future revolutionary war general and public officeholder in Durham,
New Hampshire. James Sullivan commenced the practice of law in the hamlet of
Georgetown, District of Maine, in 1767. In 1768 he married Mehitable Odiorne.
The couple had six children, among them William Sullivan, who became a noted
Federalist politician.

Upon his marriage, Sullivan moved to Biddeford, District of Maine, and
rapidly gained prominence and prosperity there as a skilled attorney. Later in
life he supplemented his income from legal fees with investments in lands,
including those in the Yazoo Territory in 1795, and in emerging manufacturing
corporations. In 1772 Sullivan and his family moved to Limerick, District of
Maine, where he became king’s counsel for York County. Soon caught up in the
revolutionary movement, he was elected in 1774 and 1775 to the Massachusetts
Provincial Congresses, where he played leading roles, and in 1775 to the state’s
Committee of Safety. Although he did not serve in the Revolution’s military
forces, he contributed to local defense measures and served throughout the
Revolution as a member of the lower house of the state legislature. Because
plural office holding was not then barred by law, in 1776 he became one of the
original justices of the Massachusetts Superior Court of Judicature, the state’s
highest court, on which he sat until 1782. In addition, he served briefly from
1779 as one of three admiralty judges in Massachusetts.

Aspiring to statewide political office, Sullivan moved to Groton, in
Massachusetts proper, in 1778 and then to Boston in 1783. A member of the
convention that in 1780 wrote the state’s first constitution, he led a
successful effort to secure representation in the lower house of the
Massachusetts General Court for every town in the state. As a result, by 1812
the Massachusetts House of Representatives was by far the largest in the United
States, with more than 400 members. After the new state constitution went into
effect, Sullivan helped in the legislative sessions of 1781 and 1782 to revise
the statutes of Massachusetts. Although he was elected to the Confederation
Congress for annual terms in 1782 and 1783, he did not attend, thus revealing
the relative insignificance into which service in that body had fallen. Instead,
Sullivan joined those working for a new national government. Upon release to the
public of the work of the Philadelphia Convention of 1787, Sullivan, then
serving a one-year term on the governor’s council, published a series of
influential essays, signed "Cassius," advocating ratification of the
new Constitution. Yet to his mortification, he was not elected a member of the
1788 convention that narrowly ratified the Constitution in Massachusetts. After
his wife’s death in early 1786, Sullivan later that year married Martha
Langdon, the sister of noted public figures John Langdon and Woodbury Langdon.

By now an increasingly influential public figure, Sullivan had become
associated with the political faction surrounding Samuel Adams and Governor John
Hancock, to whom he was a close adviser and whose frustrated vice-presidential
aspirations Sullivan promoted in 1789. In 1790, resigning the position of
Suffolk County probate judge, which he had held, since 1788, he accepted
appointment as Massachusetts attorney general. By the mid-1790s, frustrated by
the exclusion of rising figures like himself from the governing Federalist elite
of the state, he was one of the most prominent members of the state’s emerging
Democratic-Republican party, devoting much effort to building the party’s
structure and making its case in the press. Yet he was widely admired by
opposing politicians for his moderation, his skills as an attorney, and his
knowledge of the law. For example, in 1795 he tried to quell the violent acts of
a Boston crowd protesting the recently concluded Jay Treaty, the centerpiece of
Federalist foreign policy. Also, unlike many of his party colleagues, he took an
early dislike to the French Revolution. For such partisan moderation, he
continued to hold the state attorney generalship, even under Federalist state
administrations, until 1807, when he became governor. Except for brief service
in 1796 as U.S. agent representing the nation before the international
commission established to determine the boundary between Maine and Canada, his
career remained solely that of a Massachusetts statesman.

While Sullivan was a frequent newspaper polemicist, most of his contemporary
and enduring prominence stems from his writings in political economy and the
law. His first extended work, published in 1791, was Observations upon the
Government of the United States, which, dealing with suits against states by
individuals, contributed to successful efforts to adopt the Eleventh Amendment
to the U.S. Constitution. In 1792 he published his second extended work, The
Path to Riches: An Inquiry into the Origins and Use of Money; and into the
Principles of Stocks and Banks, in which he analyzed money’s role in the
economy and defended a government’s authority to terminate corporate and bank
charters for the public good. The book was particularly distinctive in attacking
excessive wealth and in linking opposition politics to envy of those in power.
This work, along with a notable opinion on bank charters issued when he was
attorney general, can be seen as the platform for Sullivan’s career-long
effort to replace private banks, which he saw as preserves of private privilege
immune from public oversight, with a state bank, a measure popular with
merchants and finally achieved in 1812, after his death. In 1795 Sullivan
published a history of his native District of Maine and followed that work in
1801 with The History of Land Titles in Massachusetts, an authoritative
and influential legal treatise used by, among others, Supreme Court justice
Joseph Story when teaching at the Harvard Law School. At the time of his death,
Sullivan left incomplete a history of Massachusetts criminal law.

From the mid-1790s Sullivan was consistently spoken of or put forth as a
Democratic-Republican candidate for governor. He first ran for governor in 1797,
losing narrowly in a three-way race. Although Federalist governor Caleb Strong
seemed to have a lock on annual elections, in 1804 Sullivan ran for the office
again. This time he polled strongly in his native Maine and, although once again
losing, made a better showing than any previous candidate of his party, greatly
enlarged the Democratic-Republican vote totals, and brought into being a genuine
statewide party organization. Losing again narrowly in 1806, he finally secured
the post in 1807 and resigned as Massachusetts attorney general.

Sullivan’s election as governor coincided with difficulties associated with
the detested embargo of 1807, which greatly injured New England’s commerce.
While a member of Thomas Jefferson’s party, Sullivan had to steer a moderate
course in the Bay State. Much to the administration’s chagrin, to alleviate
the embargo’s effects Sullivan granted many special certificates for the
import of flour into the state despite the embargo’s restrictions on commerce.
True to his moderate principles and the precariousness of the
Democratic-Republican party in a normally Federalist state, he also urged the
development of domestic manufactures to replace lost foreign trade, and he
resisted attempts to radically reform the state’s judicial system. Reelected
with a sharply reduced margin in 1808 and facing a legislature once more solidly
Federalist, he died in office before he could complete his second term.

In addition to his multifarious legal and political endeavors, Sullivan
maintained a lifelong involvement in religion, culture, and internal
improvements. He served as president of the Middlesex Canal Company from 1793
until his death and was a vigorous champion of internal improvements in and near
Boston. He was an incorporator of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in
1780 and a founder of the Massachusetts Historical Society. While he was a
defender of religious dissenters in the District of Maine, he was also a leading
layman in the affairs of the Congregational church community. Sullivan suffered
mildly from epilepsy throughout his life. He died in Boston.

A multifaceted, self-made, "new man" of the revolutionary era,
Sullivan was unusual for a universally respected man of his skills in limiting
his career to the affairs of his own state. Yet he was in every way a
nationalist, trying to steer Massachusetts, home of some influential Federalists
who considered secession a solution to the state’s difficulties, on a moderate
course while protecting its vital interests. He should also be seen as one of
the earliest professional politicians in the nation. He helped build a state
party organization from nothing, served as an advocate of the interests of those
outside the conventional circles of power and preferment, and sought and held
public office with gusto.

• The principal collection of Sullivan’s papers is possessed by the
Massachusetts Historical Society. Thomas C. Amory, Life of James Sullivan, with
Selections from His Writings (2 vols., 1859), is an unusually fine
nineteenth-century biography. The standard study of Sullivan’s political party
in Massachusetts is Paul Goodman, The Democratic-Republicans of Massachusetts:
Politics in a Young Republic (1964).

JAMES M. BANNER, JR.

BALDWIN, Loammi (21 Jan. 1745 - 20 Oct. 1807), civil engineer, was
born in Woburn, Massachusetts, the son of James Baldwin, a carpenter and
shopkeeper, and Ruth Richardson. (Some sources give his birth-date as 10 Jan.
1744.) After attending the local grammar school, Loammi was apprenticed in the
carpentry trade. As a teenager Baldwin worked in the family’s stores in Woburn
and Boston. By 1767 Baldwin was engaged as a pump maker and cabinetmaker, in
addition to helping in the family stores. In 1771 he and his friend Benjamin
Thompson, later Count Rumford, attended the lectures of Professor John Winthrop
at Harvard College and conducted home experiments based on these lectures.
Largely self-taught, Baldwin focused his studies on mathematics and hydraulics.
He married Mary Fowle in 1772. They had five children.

At the beginning of the American Revolution, Baldwin enlisted in the
Continental army as a major and was soon thereafter commissioned a lieutenant
colonel. He was later promoted to the rank of colonel of the Twenty-sixth Army
Regiment and served in Boston, New York, and New Jersey, participating in the
attack on Trenton of 25 December 1776. Health problems led to his resignation,
and he received an honorable discharge in 1777.

Upon returning home to Woburn, Baldwin served in the Massachusetts General
Court in 1778-1779 and again from 1800 to 1804. In 1780 he was appointed sheriff
of Middlesex County, a position he held until 1794. His first wife having died,
in 1791 he married Margery Fowle, her cousin; they had two children.

In 1793 Baldwin began his association with the Middlesex Canal, one of the
nation’s early important civil engineering projects. Chartered in 1793, this
28-mile waterway connected the Merrimack River with the Charles River and
Boston. Designed to assure Boston its commercial position with inland New
England communities, it cut through Baldwin’s native Middlesex County. As one
of the first artificial waterways to be built in the United States, and not a
simple river improvement project, the Middlesex influenced the design of later
American canals.

Baldwin played an important role as a promoter of the canal, as well as its
principal engineer. As an investor, Baldwin had a financial interest in the
company’s success. This financial interest in the company was not atypical for
engineers in the period. Listed as one of the chartering members of the canal,
Baldwin served on the board of directors as first vice president. As a director
from 1794 to 1804, Baldwin assisted Samuel Thompson on the first survey for the
canal. After an early survey was deemed inaccurate, Baldwin was appointed
superintendent of the Middlesex Canal in 1794, despite his lack of professional
canal experience. With this position Baldwin’s reputation as an engineer
became intertwined with his financial interest in the company. Soon after his
appointment, the board of directors sent Baldwin to study canals in Pennsylvania
and Virginia. He was also ordered to secure the assistance of William Weston,
the famed British canal engineer, then working in Pennsylvania. Baldwin lured
Weston to Massachusetts in July 1794 to consult on the canal and also to train
Baldwin and other canal employees in the proper use of his surveying tools.
Baldwin rented Weston’s tools and completed the formal survey for the
Middlesex Canal with this equipment.

As superintendent Baldwin supervised the plans and construction of the canal.
During the construction, five of his sons worked in various jobs on the canal.
Although the initial locks were made of stone, after 1799 the uncertain
financial condition of the canal company forced Baldwin to switch to wooden
locks. Finally, in 1803, the entire 28-mile canal, 3½ feet deep, with twenty
locks and eight aqueducts, was completed and opened for traffic. In the next two
years, 1804 to 1805, Baldwin designed the Medford Branch Canal, a quarter-mile
canal, with two locks, connecting the Middlesex Canal with the Mystic River.

The success of the Middlesex Canal assured Baldwin’s engineering reputation
and made him much in demand for other civil engineering projects in New England.
In 1796 Baldwin consulted with the Proprietors of Locks and Canals, a private
corporation for a bypass canal on the Merrimack River, the future location of
Lowell, Massachusetts. He also designed and consulted on the construction of
another bypass canal at Amoskeag, New Hampshire. In addition to canal
engineering, Baldwin completed surveys for turnpike companies, including the new
Concord, Stony Brook, and Montreal companies. He also surveyed and designed the
town of Baldwin, Maine. He supervised the Boston harbor construction of the
India Wharf, designed by Charles Bullfinch, and designed mill races and other
river improvement schemes. Baldwin, however, is most closely associated with and
was most proud of his work on the Middlesex Canal. Not only was this one of the
earliest artificial waterways built in the United States, but its dimensions
were later copied by the engineers of the Erie Canal, which itself became the
American canal engineering standard.

In addition to his civil engineering work, Baldwin supervised his
Massachusetts estate and achieved fame as the developer around 1794 of the
"Baldwin" apple. Also called the "Woodpecker" and
"Steele’s Red Winter," this apple was popular for its taste and
suitability for shipping.

Baldwin stands as one of the first and most influential civil engineers in
New England in the eighteenth and early nineteenth century. His combining of
financial investment with engineering skills was typical of American engineers
of the period. His work on the influential Middlesex Canal and the training of
his sons, as well as his work throughout New England, secured his reputation. In
addition to Loammi, Jr., four other sons, Cyrus Baldwin, Benjamin Franklin
Baldwin, James Fowle Baldwin, and George Rumford Baldwin, all worked as civil
engineers for canal and railroad companies.

Baldwin was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and Harvard
College awarded him an honorary masters of arts degree in 1785. He died in
Woburn, Massachusetts.

• There are large collections of Baldwin papers at Baker Library of Harvard
University, and at Clements Library of the University of Michigan. Both
collections include professional and personal accounts. The collection at
Harvard includes many reports and documents of the Middlesex Canal. For
information on Baldwin’s work on the Middlesex Canal, see Christopher Roberts,
The Middlesex Canal, 1793-1860 (1938). There is some information on
Loammi Baldwin, Sr., in George L. Vose, A Sketch of the Life and Works of
Loammi Baldwin, Civil Engineer (1885), although most of the book is devoted
to his son. See also Frederick K. Abbott, The Role of the Civil Engineer in
Internal Improvements: The Contributions of the Two Loammi Baldwins, Father and
Son, 1776-1838 (Ph.D. diss., Columbia Univ., 1952). For information on the
development of civil engineering in America and the role of the engineer
promoter, see Daniel Hovey Calhoun, The American Civil Engineer: Origins and
Conflict (1960). For additional general information, see Richard Shelton
Kirby and Philip Gustave Laurson, The Early Years of Modern Civil Engineering
(1932).

Frances C. Robb

Continuation of Discussion of the Name General Sullivan for
a Packet Boat
by Howard B. Winkler

In the April 2005 issue of Towpath Topics, I wrote that the name General
Sullivan for the packet boat line drawing by Louis Linscott may, indeed, be
correct, and that the title, General, referred to Attorney General
James Sullivan. In the October 2005 issue of Towpath Topics, Fred Lawson wrote
in response to my article, "The first packet boat was the George
Washington; the second was named Governor Sullivan for the founder of the
Middlesex Canal Corporation, according to company records." Based on
further review, I still think that there may have been a Packet Boat General
Sullivan, and, if not, then the Packet Boat Governor Sullivan may
have been initially named the General Sullivan and then renamed.

In his letter Fred Lawson mentions, "The History of Woburn" as the
reference where Louis Linscott said he found reference to the Packet Boat General
Sullivan. I looked in The History of Woburn by Samuel Sewall, c.1868, but
could not find any citations for packet boats. I did find two citations to the
Packet Boat General Sullivan in Legends of Woburn by Parker
Lindall Converse, c.1892. Perhaps this was Linscott’s source.

There is no question that there was a Packet Boat Governor Sullivan.
See the reproduction of a newspaper advertisement from the AMERICAN TRAVELLER,
Boston, Tuesday morning, June 8, 1830, at the bottom of the our home page www.middlesexcanal.org.

I have found three references to the General Sullivan, and I have to
assume that they are all independent. These are to be found in Converse’s
book, in Edward Everett Hale’s memoir, A New England Boyhood, cited in
my previous article, and in "The Old Middlesex Canal" by Arthur T.
Hopkins found in The New England Magazine, January 1898. Thus, a packet
boat with the name of, or referred to as, General Sullivan cannot be so
easily dismissed.

Hopkins wrote, "Of the passage boats there were at first two, one
running up and one running down daily. Fifty cents was the fare, no tickets
being issued. Later when the amount of travel proved insufficient to warrant two
boats, one was removed, and the General Sullivan [author’s italics] ran
alone."

If there was a packet boat General Sullivan, it could have operated
from the opening of the canal in 1803 to 1807 in which year Attorney General
James Sullivan was elected governor, or beyond if the directors delayed renaming
the boat. "Sullivan was elected governor on April 6, 1807, inaugurated on
May 29, 1807, and served through his re-election on April 4, 1808 until December
10, 1808 [when he died]. Thus he would have served 18 months as governor."
(Reference Librarian, State Library of Massachusetts).

With the naming of a packet boat the Governor Sullivan, there is the
possibility that the persistence of memory has caused it to be remembered and
recorded as the General Sullivan because he was so well known by this
former title. According to The Cyclopedia of American Biography, c.1898,
Sullivan was Attorney General for 17 years. During his term as Attorney General
he "was frequently brought to the test in this connection, especially in
the famous Fairbanks and Selfridge, murder trials ...." I propose that he
was a well-known Attorney General, but little known Governor.

In preparing this response to Fred Lawson’s letter, I went to the Patrick
J. Mogan Cultural Center in Lowell to look through the Middlesex Canal archival
holdings. I looked in treasurer’s reports and directors’ reports folders for
the years 1803 to 1808, and found no references to packet boats, and the folder
for packet boats, unfortunately, was empty. This is not to say that other
researchers cannot find references, and I look forward to more information as it
comes to light.

In the meantime, the name of General Sullivan for a Middlesex Canal
packet boat remains a possibility.

Wm. Weston to Aaron Dexter

Foreword by Dave Dettinger: -- When canal activity began throughout
the eastern seaboard at the end of the 18th century, there came a demand to
capitalize on the experience in Europe, especially in England. In 1792 Robert
Morris of Pennsylvania invited William Weston, a British expert, to supervise
the construction of canals there. When the Middlesex Canal Company heard of
his presence, the directors sent Loammi Baldwin in 1794 to gain his assistance
in surveying and related matters. On this trip Baldwin also visited the
Patowmack Canal, then being constructed under the direction of George
Washington, with whom he had had served at the Battle of Long Island and later
at the famous crossing of the Delaware.

Baldwin found that Weston was fully engaged in various projects at the time
and was reluctant to divert his efforts to Boston. However, Baldwin was
ultimately able to enlist his services by playing on a desire by Weston’s
wife to visit Boston. Weston arrived in July to participate in the survey
which determined the final route of the canal.

Subsequently Weston’s advice was sought on other aspects of canal
construction to which he responded by letter. One of these letters dealt with
the design of locks; it is reprinted here as first published in Towpath Topics
in April 1993. It was addressed to Aaron, a professor of chemistry at Harvard,
who served as a member of a committee with the (then) three superintendents of
construction "to make a contract with some persons to lay stones for the
locks"; they had requested his advice. Dexter soon after became a
director of the Middlesex Canal Company and served as president for a time
beginning in 1809.

New York May 12, 1795

Gentlemen,

Your favour of the 16th of March, having been forwarded to Virginia by Mr.
Breck (to whose care it was addressed) and after a considerable detention there,
was returned to him prevented its reaching my hand until Monday last; I mention
this circumstance that no imputation of delay may be affixed on me.

I shall endeavor to answer your several queries with as much conciseness and
perspicuity as I am able. First with regard to construction of Locks with Wood.
The perishable nature of that material is so self evident and insurmountable an
objection to its use, that it seems almost unnecessary to adduce any other
argument against it. But when it is considered in a very few years there will be
a necessity of totally rebuilding all the Locks on the Canal; that then recourse
will be had to a more permanent material; that at least two years will be
requisite for their erection; that the consequent interruption of commerce
during that period will occasion the loss of two years dividend on the whole
capital of the work, and that the public will suffer materially by being obliged
to convey their produce through a new channel. When these arguments are well
weighed and when calculations are made on the real loss eventually sustained by
the Stockholders; I have no doubt but the idea of Wodden Locks will be
abandoned.

The next material proposed to use is stone. Adverting to the nature of the
stone you mention I must pronounce it totally unfit for the purpose. The
irregularity of its figure and its extreme hardness would render the expense of
working it in a proper manner infinitely more expensive than brick. Having made
many experiments in England with this material, there is not so great a
disparity between the wages of the Mason and the Bricklayer as in this country
and where this stone has been of a free nature, I can determine with certainty
that is more expensive and tedious to erect locks of this material than with
brick. My reasons for preferring Locks of Brick are from their being more
economical, and of greater durability and strength. The idea of building Locks
without a mortar or using it partially, is so different from the custom
invariably observed in all countries, that I cannot recommend a deviation from a
practice founded on the basis of experience. The queries relative to the form of
the chamber, counterarch, thickness of the walls &cc. I would answer with
great pleasure, but that it would be of no service to you as no adequate idea of
a construction of a Lock can be conveyed by description alone. I will furnish
you with a Plan Elevation and Sections when I am informed what are the
dimensions of the boats proposed to be used on the Merrimack Canal, without this
information it is impossible that I can lay down proper rule for your guidance.
I had written some Months ago to Mr. Baldwin and Mr. Sullivan for this purpose,
had I received any answer, I should in this have forwarded to you every
explanation in my power to enable you to carry on the various works to the best
advantage. I am anxious that no errors should be committed in the execution, the
minutiae of canals, the slopes, pudling, punning, ramping(?) &c require some
previous experience to know when they are necessary and where they may be
dispensed with, being unaquainted with the mode in which your works are carrying
on, I cannot judge of the propriety or impropriety, all that I can assure you is
that you may at all times and as often as you please have my opinions on the
subject. Being engaged to direct the works in the state of New York for a few
Months, I request the favour of your directing your letters to the care of
General Schuyler at Albany.

I am gentlemen
with great respect, Yours &c
Wm Weston

Epilogue: -- No brick lock was ever built; Baldwin rejected that idea.
The triple locks at the Merrimack River were built of stone according to Weston’s
directions, but the time and expense were so great that, despite Baldwin’s
objections, the Board insisted in 1799 that most of the locks on the route to
Charlestown should be of wooden construction; only those adjacent to rivers were
built of stone.

Locks to Sleep By
contributed by Dave Dettinger

Tired of counting sheep? Try 66 locks. Take your time -- say, two weeks --
and take along a passport; you’ll be doing it in three different countries.
Where may you ask? The answer: between Vienna and Amsterdam, a total of 946
miles by water.

The first 8 locks are in the Danube River in Austria; you’ll sleep after
the first of these. The next 9 are in the Danube also, but in Germany.

Now one enters the Main-Danube Canal, completed in its modern form in 1991.
(King Ludwig of Bavaria had a smaller version built during the 19th century.)
Here you’ll encounter 16 locks, of which the topmost have lifts of 82 feet
apiece.

The Main River contributes the largest number of locks, 34 in all, ranging
from 9 to 25 feet in lift. The Rhine contributes none at all. (Take that, you
Lorelei!) Holland adds 2 more in the Holland-Amsterdam Canal. That makes a grand
total of 66.

The above data was collected by Dave and Carolyn Dettinger during a riverboat
cruise in 2004. Some other observations:

1) The vast majority of lock gates are of the conventional miter type, as
invented in the early 16th century by Leonardo DaVinci in the design of a canal
for the Duke of Milan. A few appear to be drop gates that can be sunk out of the
way.

2) There was never a lock tender in sight at any of the locks we passed. Our
daytimes were spent touring the Medieval-age towns along the waterway and gaping
at the castles and monasteries perched high above the river banks.

3) To pass under some of the bridges it was necessary to lower the wheelhouse
of our boat and clear the top deck.

4) Radio, radar and GPS kept everything moving smoothly.

Restoring the Canal
by Thomas Raphael

The Middlesex Canal Commission was formed by the Massachusetts General Court
in 1977 to " return the canal to public use". Now, almost three
decades later, you could reasonably ask "what has been accomplished?"
The answer involves many events and people which I will cover very briefly for
background, then explain the current status.

The early events centered in Woburn where the historic Baldwin House was
saved by being moved and then a canal packet boat was constructed and operated
in the stretch from Alfred Street to School Street, by the then Chairman of the
Commission, Len Harmon. This was followed by a $50,000 archaeological survey of
the route of the canal and resulted in the publication in 1980 of the
"Middlesex Canal Heritage Park feasibility Study. The study recommended
that granite markers with brass plaques showing the general route of the canal
be placed in each of the nine communities. These were installed by 1985. It
further recommended that the canal be preserved.

In 1985, under the efforts of the new chairman, Tom Raphael, the commission
started the task of the actual restoration of the extant segments of the canal.
A five phase program was proposed base on the potential for significant
construction funding through the new Federal Highway Enhancement program which
specified old canals as eligible. The area around the mill pond on the Concord
River in Billerica, the source of the water for the canal, was selected as the
first phase. Public meetings were held, conceptual plans were developed,
proposals were presented to the Town and the owners of the properties, Cambridge
Tool and Manufacturing Co. The project was approved by the Massachusetts Highway
Department which administers the Federal Funding. A contractor was selected and
design work started. Unexpectedly, Cambridge Tool was purchased by Pace
Industries of Arkansas, delaying plans several years, and later by Leggett &
Platt, with further delays. Now, ten years later this project is close to moving
ahead.

Two major conditions have to be met. First, a new owner must be found for the
dam creating the mill pond. The dam was built by the Middlesex Canal Company in
1828 by Loammi Baldwin and was passed on to the Talbot Mills and then to the
Cambridge Tool and Manufacturing Co., as the mills changed hands, however, the
dam was not included in the sales to Pace Industries and Leggett & Platt and
remains in the hands of the private families of the former owners of Cambridge
Tool and Manufacturing.

The second condition is the drafting of the four permanent legal easements
for mill property with Leggett & Platt for the two locks and the two ends of
the floating towpath across the mill pond., and pending the dam ownership. The
Commission has proposed to accept the dam and the legal documents are now being
negotiated. Perhaps actual design will start by the end of the year.

In the meantime, the Commission and the Association have established a museum
and visitor’s center in the Faulkner Mill by the mill pond and signs have been
erected at all the significant street crossings and some sites of the canal in
Billerica. Plans are being formed to extend the signage program to all the
remaining eight communities.

In an upcoming issue of Towpath Topics we will explain what progress is being
made to preserve the rest of the canal remnants.

The National Register of the Middlesex Canal
by Thomas Raphael

The long awaited Nomination to Amend the the 1972 National Register of the
Middlesex Canal is about to reach the final stages with public hearings this
Fall. There will be three hearings in Billerica, Winchester and Medford to which
the property owners and abutters of the canal route will be invited to comment
and approve the submission.

The original Nomination included only the existing canal segments in Woburn,
Wilmington, Billerica, Chelmsford and Lowell. The prism of the canal in
Charlestown, Somerville, Medford and Winchester had been built-over early in the
mid 19th century and was not accurately known. The 1980 "Middlesex Canal
Heritage Park Feasibility Study" of the Industrial Archaeology Associates,
recommended that old maps and deeds should reveal the location of the canal in
these areas and that they should be included in the National Register to
preserve the history of the canal.

In 1999 the Public Archaeology Laboratory (PAL) of Pawtucket, RI was hired to
conduct a two part comprehensive survey in parallel, one above ground and the
other of archaeological archives covering the full range of resources associated
with the canal. This became the basis for the amendment but also revealed what
work remained to be done.

In 2002, work was started to complete a map of the exact location of the
canal using current Assessor’s Plates and lots as the basis of the maps. Old
maps and deeds in the Registry of Deeds in Northern and Southern Middlesex
County, and the local libraries and Historical Commissions, finally gave up the
critical information and a 34 page Map Book has been computer generated of the
complete canal in relation to the current lot owners.

As a result, the current Nomination to Amend the National Register is in the
hands of the Massachusetts Historical Commission for the legal processing and
submission to the National Park Service.

Middlesex Canal Association - Speakers Bureau
Alan Seaburg, Chair

Dave Dettinger’s suggestions for organizing a Speaker’s Bureau are as
follows: Needed would be a list of the talks that people are prepared to give,
and do give, ground rules for dealing with outsiders to the Association, a list
of equipment needed by speakers and a central person who would be the contact
person, and who could keep track of who spoke where and for how much. There was
a discussion by the MCA Board about charging for the talks. $150 was the
suggested rate, based on what other societies have to pay. Dave further
suggested creating a brochure which would include the general background of the
canal, which we could send to local historical societies, other canal societies,
any other interested groups, and our membership.

Dave made motion "that the Middlesex Canal Association establish a
Speaker’s Bureau with a director and assistants as needed. His/her
responsibilities will be to collect information on canal related presentation
topics in the form of descriptive paragraphs, together with biographies of
speakers who are prepared to present them. A central task is to maintain a log
of presentations, including title, date, audience, and location; other aspects
may be worth recording as well." Howard Winkler moved its acceptance and
Jean Potter seconded it and the motion was carried.

Speaker: Dave Dettinger
David Dettinger is a retired engineer living in Winchester. He joined the
Middlesex Canal Association in 1962 and has been an active member ever since,
serving as an Officer and Board member. He specializes in studies of the
historical background of this and other early canals in the East.

Facilities needed: Dave uses an overhead projector for his
illustrations. A sound system is desirable but not necessary in small settings.

Honorarium: [to be negotiated]

Contact: Dave Dettinger, 3 Penn Road, Winchester, Ma 01890-3435

Talks developed for the MCA audience:
(1) "James Sullivan, a Man of Action" for the MCA on Saturday, 6/19/96
96, in Woburn.
(2) ‘"From Transportation to Power: the Story of the Pawtucket
Canal" for the MCA on Saturday, 9/27/97, at Lowell.
(3) "Boats and Boating on the Middlesex Canal" for the MCA on 11/1/98
in Woburn
(4) "Colonel Loammi Baldwin and His Sons; Talent for a New Republic",
for the MCA on 11/7/99 in Woburn.
(5) "The Patowmack Canal" for the MCA on Sunday, 1/29/06, at the
Museum in North Billerica,

Talks for other organizations:
(1) "The Middlesex Canal: A Waterway through the Mystic River Valley",
for Mystic River Association on Wednesday, 2/6/02, in Winchester.
(2) "The Canal That Bisected Boston: Extending the Middlesex Canal"
for the MITRE Retirees Association on 12/3/02 in Bedford.Summary: In 1803 a canal was completed through Middlesex County joining
the Merrimack and Charles Rivers, thereby enabling a commercial waterway that
extended 80 miles from Boston as far as Concord, New Hampshire. The first long
canal in the United States, it was dug by hand for 27 miles and included 20
locks, plus aqueducts, bridges and landings as it passed through towns such as
Woburn on its way from Charlestown to present-day Lowell. Soon after, boats
hauled across the Charles could be towed through Boston to the waterfront by
virtue of a sea level canal. Until superseded by the railroad, this waterway was
the chief avenue for access to the North Country, and it played a strategic role
in establishing Boston as a center of commerce.
(3) "The Middlesex Canal" for the Wakefield Retired Men's Club on
Wednesday, 7/9/03, in Wakefield.
(4) "The Old Middlesex Canal" for the Lynnfield Historical Society on
Tuesday, 4/27/04.

Speaker: Howard Winkler
Howard Winkler is a retired engineer, lives in Arlington, and has been Treasurer
of the Middlesex Canal Association for 18 years. He is a also past president of
the Arlington Historical Society.

Talk before the Middlesex Canal Association:
(1) "Building the Middlesex Canal in the 21st Century" (Nov 2002)
Describes construction of the canal as a modern engineering project.

Talks before the Arlington Historical Society:
(1) "Arlington on the Edge" (Nov. 2001) Presents the geographical,
geological, botanical, zoological, historical, municipal, and cultural items of
interest on and near the perimeter of Arlington.
(2) "Dead and Buried" (Oct. 1999) History of Arlington’s Old Burying
Ground, Mount Pleasant Cemetery, Prince Hall Cemetery, and St. Paul’s
Cemetery.

Project Ideas and Volunteer Opportunities

There are plenty of projects just waiting to be undertaken by any of our
members and proprietors. A sampler of projects follows. If anyone is interested
in any of these or other projects, contact Bill Gerber at <bill_gerber at
bostonbbs dot org>.

Volunteer/Docent:
During the summer months, assist with opening the museum on weekends and
interpreting its exhibits to visitors. Conduct sales of whatever items are of
interest to visitors.

Education/Publications:
Assist with school field trip visits to the Middlesex Canal and the Museum.

Pick up and continue Dave Dettinger’s research into the Mill Creek Canal,
that provided the Middlesex Canal with access to the Haymarket Square area and
out into Boston Harbor.

Research and write a report about the canals of East Cambridge (who built
them, when & why, interests served, how boats were moved from the Middlesex
to East Cambridge & return.

Research and write an article about the "Canal Bridge", between
Boston and Cambridge (where the Museum of Science is now located).

Research and write an article describing how bands of log rafts were brought
down the Merrimack River, disassembled and locked through at Middlesex Village,
reassembled and brought down the canal to Medford, Cambridge or Boston. (Was the
channel, formed by a berm that parallels the east shore of the Merrimack, built
to support this activity?)

Research and write an article describing the development and use of the
"Raft Locks", i.e., the extended-length Guard Locks that were built on
either side of the Mill Pond at the Concord River.

Research and write an article describing Middlesex Canal Company’s efforts
to make the Concord River navigable, and the results of same. (What portions
were used, by whom, when and for what purposes.)

Exhibits: (Also see suggestions under other categories, below.)
Build an exhibit to explain how the Middlesex Canal was surveyed and why it was
so important, both to the canal and, more broadly, to American Civil
Engineering.

Build an exhibit "How the canal worked - on the river &
overland". (e.g., boats were rowed, poled or sailed on the river, and
assisted past the river canals by tow animals. On the Middlesex, they were
towed, probably using livery animals (rent-a-critters). Where did they come
from? How often were they rested, watered and fed, and "swapped out"?
How were the boat crews housed and fed? Explain the system of assessing cargos
and collecting tolls, to include the use of "landings" along both the
river and the Middlesex Canal, and how tolls were collected.

Research Resources:
Copy art from all available sources - e.g., as referenced in Lewis Lawrence and
listed in Andover Gallery’s survey of Merrimack Valley art and artifacts, and
"other". Prepare suitable portions of same for museum exhibit.

Copy and catalog all (or any portion of) available historical references to
companies that used the canals - e.g., the Merrimack Boating Company, the Union
Boating Company, the Boston and Concord Boating Company, and the Boston
Steamboat Company; and all of the "transients" to the extent they can
be identified.

Add to the three items above - all references to the canals that can be found
from the newspapers of the towns through/by which the canals passed, for the
period in which the canal was in operation (from the time of incorporation to
the time of dissolution).

Build a database of available information from available lock site and
landing ledgers (boats, owners, cargos, dates of passage, tolls charged, etc.)
Assess for: numbers of boats vs. year; cargos carried up and down vs. season
& year (how it changed with time); owners; etc, etc.

Work with Billerica Rescue or Police (whoever!) to recover whatever iron
objects might be buried in the bottom of the Billerica Mill Pond that might have
come from the Floating Towpath. Map out the location from which each object was
recovered. Similarly, measure, describe and map out any underwater timber crib
structures, and/or heaps of stone that might be found in the Mill Pond or along
the shore. Analyze and build a display to exhibit same.

Organize and conduct a survey of submerged structures on the Merrimack; e.g.,
in the "lakes" behind Essex, Pawtucket and Concord Mill Dams. (This
might begin with a sonar scan of the areas of Parker’s, Peter’s, Hunt’s,
Wicasee, Taylor’s and Hill’s Falls; also the Billerica Mill Pond for
remnants of the floating tow path; with follow-up dives on anything interesting
found.)

Organize and conduct an archaeology "dig" at Moor’s Falls: (a) in
the lower lock site to document the size and construction of that lock, and to
catalog, measure and photograph (and/or otherwise appropriately describe)
whatever components are found; and (b) at the site of the lock tender’s house.

Same at Cromwell’s Falls: (a) in the lock; and (b) at the site of the lock
tender’s house if it can be located.

Same at Wicasee Falls, to the extent that worthwhile objectives can be
identified.

Partial List of Resources (links will be available at www.middlesexcanal.org):
1) Mogan Center - The original records of the Middlesex Canal Corporation and
other Middlesex Canal materials are archived at the Mogan Center at UMass/Lowell.

2) The Middlesex Canal Museum in N. Billerica has a collection of materials
relating to the canal’s history.

3) Carl Seaburg’s Middlesex Canal papers

4) Library of Congress - American Memories

5) Google Books is a great resource for online access to rare books,
including a wealth of material relating to the Middlesex Canal

WORLD CANALS CONFERENCE
by Nolan Jones

Bill Gerber and I went to the World Canals Conference September 12-14 in
Bethlehem , PA. There were about 150 people plus 40 6th grade students from
Rochester.

The technical sessions were divided into three categories -- Heritage,
Restoration and Economic Benefit. Roger Squires spoke about the canal side
developments along the restored canals in the UK. There are several areas where
the town/city centers have been greatly improved.

Field trips included the National Canal Museum, Hugh Moore Park, Lock 11 on
the Delaware Canal, Plane 9 on the Morris Canal and the derelict Bethlehem Steel
Works.

Sun, Nov 5, 2006, 2:30pm: MCA Fall Meeting at the Museum (N.
Billerica). The featured speaker will be Bill Gerber.

Note on the people of the Middlesex Canal Association - The
Middlesex Canal Association is an organization not only of purpose, but of
people. Many members, proprietors, officers and directors have known each other
for a very long time. Some members have been with the Association since its
founding over forty years ago. In September, Edith Hoxie passed away. Edith was
the wife of Colonel Wilbar Hoxie, long-time Board member, historian, and former
president of the Association. Board members Tom Dahill, Jean Potter, and Alan
Seaburg accompanied Colonel Hoxie to the Maine coast to scatter Edith’s ashes.
At times like this, I am reminded of all the caring, dedicated, and expert
people I’ve met during my short decade as a proprietor and director. We should
all be so fortunate as to have friends like these who are dedicated not only to
the preservation of history but to each other’s needs in good times and bad.
-- Robert Winters, Editor

An Apology and an Invitation -- We did not publish an issue of
Towpath Topics for Spring 2006. In the future you should expect an issue each
spring and fall (and an occasional special issue). Members, proprietors, and
others are encouraged to submit materials for possible inclusion in Towpath
Topics or on our website. Please send any contributed articles and/or photos to
Robert Winters, Editor, at 366 Broadway, Cambridge, MA 02139 or (preferably) via
e-mail at robert@middlesexcanal.org.

We are now putting together an e-mail list for announcements. If you would
like to be added to the list, provide your e-mail address in your membership
renewal or send it to webmaster Robert Winters at robert@middlesexcanal.org.